# Bush Fired Colin Powell **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 1, 2006, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812 "2006-10-01T05:26:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/1 "2006-10-01T05:26:16Z")
“Falling On His Sword” [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/27/AR2006092700106.html](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/27/AR2006092700106.html) > [@](#): > > On Wednesday, November 10, 2004, eight days after the president he served was elected to a second term, Secretary of State Colin Powell received a telephone call from the White House at his State Department office. The caller was not President Bush but Chief of Staff Andrew Card, and he got right to the point…Bush wanted Powell’s resignation letter dated two days hence, on Friday, November 12, Card said, although the White House expected him to stay at the State Department until his successor was confirmed by the Senate… (The rest of the article is a very interesting explication of Colin Agonistes, centering around the construction of his (in)famous UN speech, turds served and dined upon…) Fired him. Closest thing to a sane person in the whole menagerie. Because he didn’t get along with Rummy and Cheney. Its like that Mark Chapman idiot, who had a gun on John and Yoko, and shot John. Is this finally it, Mr. Powell? Has it finally sunk in that loyalty is commendable only when deserved? How is it that you consented to pimp for these people and offered them invaluable support while they misled us into a feverswamp? With the abundance of evidence on open display, how is it that you didn’t know? What, Sudden Onset Alzheimer’s? Turned into a dumfuk in a matter of hours? They exploited your dignity and good name, and the naive trust placed in you. A wad of toilet paper gets more respectful use and dignified retirement. You owe these people nothing. You owe us a great deal, a very great deal indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/2 "2006-10-01T05:38:04Z")
I hate Colin Powell for positing something as brilliant as the Powell Doctrine and then letting himself be talked into violating it. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/3 "2006-10-01T05:47:51Z")
You know, I hate, hate, hate to use the phrase, but I confess that after I heard the UN presentation, I composed the sentence: “Yep, the Bush administration just burnt up its best n\*\*\*\*\*.” I apologise for any offense, but that seemed pretty clearly to be the attitude. Needed someone with street-cred. Haul in loyal boy, who’d cry “yes massa, w’ever you say massa, I’ll tell 'em folks at the UN.” Burn up the one commodity he had. There was always a real: “you can trust a black man” thing going on in contemporary USA. At least that’s over. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/4 "2006-10-01T05:50:36Z")
To the OP, Colin Powell had leaked it well before the first term’s expiry that he didn’t intend to serve a second. So with respect to friend **elucidator** , I think you’ve got it wrong. Should be able to find a discussion or two, perhaps even here to back that up. I remember it clearly. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/5 "2006-10-01T05:51:46Z")
[QUOTE=Cisco] I hate Colin Powell for positing something as brilliant as the Powell Doctrine and then letting himself be talked into violating it. [/QUOTE] Not only did Powell sell himself out, but he sold himself out _for these guys_. Talk about humiliating. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/6 "2006-10-01T06:04:18Z")
Remember that Colin Powell was the Army Major who first ‘investigated’ the Mai Lai massacre, and covered it up. This ‘team player’ mentality aided in his later promotions. So what else did you expect of him. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/7 "2006-10-01T06:04:30Z")
[QUOTE=Sevastopol] To the OP, Colin Powell had leaked it well before the first term’s expiry that he didn’t intend to serve a second. So with respect to friend \*_elucidator_, I think you’ve got it wrong. Should be able to find a discussion or two, perhaps even here to back that up. I remember it clearly. [/QUOTE] The referenced article discusses that very point. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/8 "2006-10-01T06:25:12Z")
Ah I see it now. You’re hoping he’ll write a tell-all memoir, isn’t it so? Perhaps offering a little psychic encouragement through the ether? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/9 "2006-10-01T06:29:23Z")
Colin Powell’s mistake was to assume his role was to offer his best advice even if it differed from what people wanted to hear. The Bush administration is apparently incapable of realizing the value of informed dissent. Their apparent theory is “We’re right and everybody else is wrong. So why should we have any wrong people around when we could have all right people around instead?” It’s a defendable position, I suppose, but only if you accept the premise that the group opinion will never make a single mistake. Look back to the way John Kennedy handled the Cuban missile crisis. He brought in a team of experts with widely divergent opinions. Then they discussed the options, he listened to same widely different ideas on what should be done, and then he decided what course he wanted to follow. He realized that hearing alternatives was not some admission of ineptitude - he clearly retained his role as the “decider” but he was making real decisons between real choices not just listening to echoes and then adding his own. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/10 "2006-10-01T06:31:36Z")
> [@](#): > > You’re hoping he’ll write a tell-all memoir, isn’t it so? Perhaps offering a little psychic encouragement through the ether? I don’t think Powell is ever going to reveal anything about the inner workings of the Bush adminsitration that isn’t already obvious. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/11 "2006-10-01T06:35:49Z")
BTW, if Colin Powell had a shred of decency, or a drop of honor in his blood. He would indeed “fall on his sword” and not in any mealy or metaphoric sense. How far that same duty of honor may rest is a matter open to debate. **Little Nemo** I agree, they’ll be no reveal from CP. He’ll not use what little he has left for any remedial purpose. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/12 "2006-10-01T06:36:41Z")
Colin Powell could have been the first Black President, but Bush ruined it for him. What a prick. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/13 "2006-10-01T06:38:50Z")
No, Powell would have wiped the floor with Bush and McCain (and Gore) if he had wanted to be president. He didn’t want to be prez, and the rest is history. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/14 "2006-10-01T06:51:44Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] Colin Powell could have been the first Black President, but Bush ruined it for him. What a prick. [/QUOTE] Sorry to Hi-Jack, but do you believe the GOP would have a black man as its candidate for President? ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/15 "2006-10-01T06:52:08Z")
[QUOTE=Sevastopol] Ah I see it now. You’re hoping he’ll write a tell-all memoir, isn’t it so? [/quote] Too little, too late. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/16 "2006-10-01T07:01:44Z")
I’ve never understoond Powell’s credibility. During the Clinton years, when he was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he famously blocked attempts to intervene in the Balkans. He famously kept a picture of a Serbian SAM site in his office and lectured Senators and Congresspeople on the dangers of intervening. Then, he famously wrote an op-ed piece in the NY Times opposing intervention while still in office. As mentioned above, he led a less than vigorous investigation into the My Lai masacre. He attempted to block the Clinton interventions in the Balkans which has largely been successful and established a post-cold war US as a global hegemon. He also helped sell the invasion of Iraq which has undone all the work of the Clinto administration and has probably sown the seeds of destruction for the United States and will likely destabilize the entire Middle East and thus disrupt the global economy. He is and always has been a Republican stooge. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/17 "2006-10-01T07:24:16Z")
[QUOTE=Sevastopol] Sorry to Hi-Jack, but do you believe the GOP would have a black man as its candidate for President? [/QUOTE] Well, I can’t speak for the entire GOP, but I’m a Republican and I would certainly vote for a black man (or woman, for that matter) for president. Perhaps you haven’t noticed that the greatest real progress (as opposed to appointments made for show and often given to totally unqualified and/or inept people just for the sake of appearing to promote minorities and women – i.e., Joycelyn Elders and Janet Reno, just to name two) and the most substantive government positions acheived by minorities and women in this country have actually come from Republican administrations? Do the names Clarence Thomas, Condoleeza Rice and Alberto Gonzales ring any bells? Of course, these are _conservative_ women, blacks, and Hispanics so they won’t count for much around here…but the fact remains that women and minorities fare better under Republican administrations, _and_ they can deliver the goods. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/18 "2006-10-01T08:36:13Z")
Oh, hell, yes, **Starkers**! If only we weren’t so blinded by our hatred for The Leader, we might be able to speak honestly about such wonders as these. Clarence! Who can say enough about Clarence! Even as we speak, learned men whisper in law libraries in tones of awe and admiration of his acute perception and vast legal scholarship, and how he can speak while Scalia drinks a glass of water, it is the miracle of the age! And Condoleeza! Where would we be without her guidance and intelligence? Where, indeed! Why, without her, our splendid military adventure in Iraq might not have been so marvelously realized. Or even, God forbid, not realized _at all_! Then where would we be, I ask you? You think quagmires grow on trees? She is an inspiration to little gap toothed lesbians everywhere! And Gonzales! A giant of jurisprudence! What other man would have as expansive a vision that he has shown us, the previously unrealized power of the signing statement, how efficiently it distills three branches of government into the only one that is, really, worth having! You see, its not so much that they are conservative that rouses our ire. Its that everything they touch turns to shit that bugs us. However marvelous a truly spectacular display of galactic incompetence may be, the wonderment pales, and we want some variety. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/19 "2006-10-01T09:30:02Z")
Sorry, **luci** …it’s late, and, uh… zzzzzzzzz… ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2006, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812/20 "2006-10-01T10:23:03Z")
[QUOTE=elucidator] She is an inspiration to little gap toothed lesbians everywhere! [/QUOTE] That’s a new one on me! I thought she had a husband in the Oval Office. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-fired-colin-powell/374812.md?page=2)